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A Novel
by Susan Straight
From National Book Award finalist Susan Straight, a captivating new novel about a group of nurses fighting through the first year of a pandemic and the beloved California community they will risk their lives to protect.
In August 2020, a group of nurses are working in the ICU at a hospital in San Bernardino at the height of a Covid surge: Larette Embers, whose husband, Grief, is an animal control officer; Cherrise Martinez, whose husband died years ago in a car crash, and whose daughter Raquel has been sent to a Coachella date farm to live with her great-aunt to avoid the virus; and Marisol Manalang, born in the Philippines but based in Sacramento. To safeguard their families, the nurses are living in a makeshift RV camp close to the hospital; they share food and cigarettes yet keep their work private. For this is a country in crisis, and they are assisting strangers at the edge of death with infinite tenderness and growing desperation.
As the nurses struggle with the skyrocketing number of sick patients, Cherisse's daughter goes missing. Grief's friend Johnny Frias, a California Highway Patrol officer, joins the search to find her, and the resulting journey leads to new love and loss, pushing all our characters to their breaking points. Brilliantly highlighting both the quiet heroism and extraordinary bravery of first responders, Sacrament once again proves that Susan Straight is the "essential voice in American writing and in writing of the West" (the New York Times).
Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award 2026
Here is an interesting award recognizing distinguished fiction that tells American stories in a uniquely American voice, one that reflects Mark Twain's incisive curiosity and humanity. Celebrating its tenth year. Longlist 2026 Are You Happy?: Stories — Lori Ostlund Atavists: Stories — Lydia Mille...
-Anne_Glasgow
"[A]stonishing...Straight reminds us of where we have been and where we are going without once looking away." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Told in alternating points of view, the narrative captures the heroism and sacrifice of healthcare workers during the pandemic, and is shot through with rich depictions of Southern California's landscape ... It's a vibrant drama." —Publishers Weekly
"Three first-responder nurses during the pandemic live in a hastily planned trailer park near the San Bernardino hospital where all day, every day they confront the comatose and the dying ... Straight offers their grief and work much as a celebrant holds up a sacrifice, for all to see and contemplate." —Los Angeles Times
"In Sacrament, once again, Susan Straight delivers a transcendent and essential novel that shines light on those too often overlooked and illuminates humanity and community in our darkest days. Sacrament is a book about the pandemic and first responders, sure, but it's a canonical California novel written by a storyteller at the top of her game." —Ivy Pochoda, author of Ecstasy
"What a rich, beautiful novel, rooted in the grim landscape of Southern California in the grips of Covid. The hardship, the longing for connection, the bravery of essential workers in the trenches of August 2020. Straight's characters feel like they were formed from the clay of the earth and given the breath of life." —Steph Cha, author of Your House Will Pay
This information about Sacrament was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Susan Straight has published nine novels, including Mecca, A Million Nightingales, and Highwire Moon, and one memoir, In the Country of Women. She's been a finalist for the Kirkus Prize, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, the National Book Award, among other honors, and received the Lannan Prize, the O. Henry Award, the Edgar Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Robert Kirsch Award for lifetime achievement from the Los Angeles Times Book Prizes. Her fiction has been translated into ten languages. She was born in Riverside, California, where she lives with her family.
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